This space is for building my personal learning environment associated with the IP&T program at Brigham Young University

Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Open Education Licensing

This past week for the open ed class we reviewed several documents and a video regarding issues related to copyrights, fair use, and the creative commons licensing that rights holders can use to share their innovations without relinquishing their rights. I asked Dr. Wiley if there were any circumstances where a creative commons license had been violated and the courts had supported that license in ruling against the violator. He replied that there was some case law and cited an example. I hope sometime during the next week or two to identify a case, particularly in the U.S., and see the basis for the ruling.

I personally agree that a society that innovates needs to find a way to share intellectual property in such a way that the personal financial and ownership value that is derivable by the rights holder is not lost while allowing that property to be usable by other innovators. I am sure that there is, or shortly will be, some circumstance where court will have to rule on some type of damage claim made by a creative commons licensor when another person uses the license in an inappropriate way and derives some income or recognition through that inappropriate use of the license. Since I am new to this area this information may be commonly known to those who have had an interest in these ideas for some time. I am eager to seek these cases out and see how the judges justified the ruling protecting the rights holder and the basis for damages assessed.